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Mostly Negative Changes Coming to Singapore Airlines’ Award Program

March 1, 2017
by
Million Mile Secrets Million Mile Secrets

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Million Mile SecretsMillion Mile Secrets Team

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Mostly bad news for folks who like to redeem Singapore Airlines miles.

Via Point Me to the Plane, Singapore Airlines is increasing the price of certain award tickets and removing the current 15% discount for booking online. These changes go into effect March 23, 2017.

That stinks, but the good news is they’ll no longer charge fuel surcharges on award tickets.

After March 23, 2017, You’ll Pay Significantly MORE Miles for an Amazing First Class Suite on Singapore Airlines

Increase in fees for changes made to award tickets online, from $12 to $20

Most of these changes are negative. But they will no longer charge fuel surcharges on award tickets. And that could save you several hundred dollars per ticket.

That said, if you’re planning a trip, it’s worth booking your tickets before these changes happen (March 23, 2017). Because with the removal of the 15% online booking discount, you’ll automatically pay 15% more on all tickets after this date.

Here’s What This Means for You

Say you want to buy a First Class ticket from New York to Frankfurt on Singapore Airlines. With the current award chart AND the 15% online booking discount, this ticket will cost 57,375 Singapore Airlines miles one-way.

With the new chart (and WITHOUT a 15% online booking discount!) the same ticket will cost 76,000 Singapore Airlines miles one-way.

That’s an increase of 18,625 Singapore Airlines miles each way! But after March 23, 2017, you’ll save ~$180 in fuel surcharges. So it could be worth it for some folks to pay more miles but save cash.

Even After These Changes Go Into Effect, You’ll Still Be Able to Fly to Hawaii on United Airlines for Fewer Miles When You Book Through Singapore Airlines

Bottom Line

The changes are mostly negative, including higher award ticket prices and no more 15% online booking discount.

But the good news is, they’re eliminating fuel surcharges (that can save you hundreds of dollars!). And the changes do NOT affect award tickets on their Star Alliance partners like United Airlines.

What do you think about this news? Let me know in the comments!

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Editorial Note: We're the Million Mile Secrets team. And we're proud of our content, opinions and analysis, and of our reader's comments. These haven’t been reviewed, approved or endorsed by any of the airlines, hotels, or credit card issuers which we often write about. And that’s just how we like it! :)

When I got the email from KrisFlyer about this, I was a bit bummed about the loss of the 15% online booking discount, but to be fair that was exceedingly generous of them IMO and I’m actually surprised it lasted as long as it did. I do agree that the removal of fuel surcharges will somewhat or even greatly offset this though. When I flew SQ 11 in “R” a.k.a Suites back in Jan. 2015, I paid around $340 cash for the surcharge. I think the 15% difference would have been around 13,200 KF miles (I’m not looking at the award chart as I write this, just going by memory of that trip’s award pricing), so the new “extra miles spend” but reduced cash outlay implies roughly 2.5cpm valuation for equivalency purposes in that case. Not too shabby. Yeah, it always hurts when things aren’t as fantastic as they once were, but this was a case of a change/devaluation that was practically inevitable. BTW, it was a fantastic flight experience and IMO well worth even the KF miles price and then some!

Editorial Note: We're the Million Mile Secrets team. And we're proud of our content, opinions and analysis, and of our reader's comments. These haven’t been reviewed, approved or endorsed by any of the airlines, hotels, or credit card issuers which we often write about. And that’s just how we like it! :)